A cashless Christmas for foreign fishing crews far from home

A sec­ond group of Ukrain­ian crew mem­bers aboard the arrest­ed ves­sel Alek­san­dr Kseno­fontov in Dunedin are at log­ger­heads with employ­ers and have approached the Mar­itime Union seek­ing help.

Mar­itime Union Gen­er­al Sec­re­tary Trevor Han­son says the sit­u­a­tion with the fish­ing ves­sel is a clas­sic exam­ple of the prob­lems still com­ing to the sur­face in the fish­ing indus­try.

Mr Han­son says around 14 senior crew mem­bers, believed to be offi­cers, have approached the Dunedin police and the Mar­itime Union claim­ing their con­tract has been bro­ken.

An inspec­tion of their doc­u­ments showed their pay had been slashed to a frac­tion of the hours worked, after heavy tax­a­tion under Russ­ian law and large pay­ments to the employ­er were all tak­en out of their pay.

“The employ­ers want to pay these work­ers off with $300 for months of work at sea, with the rest of the mon­ey com­ing when they return home at some unspec­i­fied date, which could mean nev­er.”

Mr Han­son says the Alek­san­dr Kseno­fontov has had ongo­ing issues since being tied up at the Dunedin wharves sev­er­al weeks ago.

“This type of sit­u­a­tion is exact­ly why the Gov­ern­ment intro­duced new reg­u­la­tions in the fish­ing indus­try, yet it seems some of the indus­try play­ers are still doing things the old way.”

He says the ves­sel had its first crew leave after a pay dis­pute, with sev­er­al of those crew still in New Zealand involved in the dis­pute process.

“Now a sec­ond group of offi­cers are obvi­ous­ly fac­ing a sim­i­lar prob­lem.”

Mr Han­son says a new crew had been brought in who were onboard the ves­sel, and he would not be sur­prised if a sim­i­lar sit­u­a­tion devel­oped with them.

He says the ves­sel was also arrest­ed in a sep­a­rate dis­pute over repair work.

Mr Han­son says the con­cern of the Mar­itime Union is that over­seas crews are being returned home with promis­es of future pay­ment that were impos­si­ble to enforce.

“Our con­cern is with some of the dubi­ous prac­tices that may go on in the home coun­try where this labour is recruit­ed.”

He says the “out of mind, out of sight” atti­tude with for­eign crews was still preva­lent, with crews involved in dis­putes often hur­ried­ly sent home before their claims could be inspect­ed under New Zealand reg­u­la­tions.

Mr Han­son says the indus­try was watch­ing to see how the sit­u­a­tion was resolved under the new improved Gov­ern­ment reg­u­la­tions of the fish­ing indus­try.